4.18(a)
Palliar
(Detour from Scott’s Road to Brigg’s Trace)
From Oomloor, there was a
detour to the second of our bridle paths –
Brigg’s Trace. And in 1866, if a traveller left the road at Oomloor and crossed
over to Colonel Briggs's road, and went to a place called Palliar, in May and
June, the bison were plentiful.
Fitzwilliam Pollock had three days' shooting along this portion, and got four bison, two very large bulls and two cows, and three sambur, one a very fine stag, two barking-deer and some small game. He saw at least 30 bison and 12 elephants, three of them fine tuskers, but as there was a fine of £50 for shooting an elephant, he left them alone. He had the following to say about Brigg’s Trace:
Fitzwilliam Pollock had three days' shooting along this portion, and got four bison, two very large bulls and two cows, and three sambur, one a very fine stag, two barking-deer and some small game. He saw at least 30 bison and 12 elephants, three of them fine tuskers, but as there was a fine of £50 for shooting an elephant, he left them alone. He had the following to say about Brigg’s Trace:
“I often
intended returning there, but one thing and another prevented me, and besides
it was off my beat. All my shooting I got whilst employed on duty; had I been
an idle man I could have slain ten times what I did, but my time was not my
own, and marching hurriedly interferes sadly with sport. This same trip,
instead of returning to Oomloor and going on to Nungklow by the government road, I followed Col. Briggs’s road, and
although it was so circuitous and passed through an uninhabited country, yet,
after so much had been spent on it, I think it was a pity it was never
completed, especially as it passed over a plateau, just like Ootacamund, and
6,000 feet high; it would have opened out the interior of these hills, a thing
of much importance now-a-days”.
Fitzwilliam Pollock had to
camp near a heavy ‘cutting’, and strolled off to the left next day in search of
game. He met some Cossyahs, and they said that they would show him game if he came
to their village, a little off the unfinished cart-road.
He sent one man back for his traps and went with them. They took him through
beautiful park-like scenery, and soon pointed out a stag, which, after careful
stalking, he killed. He saw several does and the marks of bison and elephants,
and now and then the barking-deer. In the village they had the head and horns
of a fine bull bison and two or three of the serow[159]. His traps
came up late, and he tried a river close by for fish, but only caught three with
a fly.
At night a tiger killed one
of the villager’s cattle, and he meant to sit over the carcass. However he
decided to inspect it, carelessly walking along with a dozen or more men behind
him. As he approached with only his express loaded with a shell in his hand, the
tiger sprang, and on impulse he fired. The shot broke its back and another shot
behind the ear killed it - it measured a full 9 feet 1 inch. He got a bear the
same day, and moved on to opposite Mooflong, giving the Cossyahs some powder
and a few rupees. The tigress came to eat the bull that night, and was killed
by a Cossyah who brought him the skin later in Shillong, and was rewarded for
it.
In
1866, approaching the Khasi Hills from the northern face, at 2,200 feet above the sea
level, Major Briggs noted that the first pines appeared.
From this the natural growth changed from dense bamboo jungle and lofty grass
to comparatively low grass, and there was an entire absence of bamboo and other
plants characteristic of the Assam jungles[160].
2 miles beyond Palliar, at an elevation of 2,500 feet, Colonel Briggs was then building
the second Inspection Bungalow from Gowhatty, and he believed the spot would
prove generally healthy as it was above the fever zone.
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